The best new spa treatments, from cryotherapy to Kegels
Treat yourself to NYC’s most innovative and rejuvenating spa therapies.
Compression therapy
Suit up and slim down in a next-level compression jacket and boots.
The FDA-approved devices provide hands-free lymphatic drainage massage to reduce water weight, promote cell regeneration and hasten recovery.
“If one does the Ballancer Pro every day, it’s possible to lose the water weight of two dress sizes in just one week,” says celebrity facialist Joanna Vargas, who offers the treatment at her Fifth Avenue spa.
“It’s a very relaxing, gentle pressure that moves from the toes up the legs, to the midsection.”
How’s that for a main squeeze?
Ballancer Pro, from $200 for 30 minutes.
Feminine rejuvenation
Think of BTL Emsella, one of the most popular treatments at VSpot Sexual Health Spa, as a celebrity personal trainer for your pelvic floor.
The non-invasive, FDA-approved device uses high-intensity focused electromagnetic technology to induce deep muscle contractions.
Fully dressed clients simply take a seat on the chair — a k a the Kegel Throne — and let it pulse. “You do 11,000 perfect Kegels in 28 minutes,” says VSpot founder and former “Real Housewives of New York City” star Cindy Barshop, who recommends the therapy for urinary incontinence and intimate health.
“There’s a major sex benefit,” she adds. “It increases friction during intercourse.”
BTL Emsella, $300 per session.
Flotation therapy
Weightlessly floating on the surface of skin-temperature, Epsom salt-saturated water is a deeply meditative experience.
Absent external stimuli, your mind relaxes and stress eases.
This type of restricted environmental stimulation therapy (REST) is even said to enhance creativity.
Lift / Next Level Floats in Carroll Gardens offers giant egg-shaped pods with music and lights and rooms with starlight-effect ceilings; the features can be switched off for darkness and silence.
Worried the salt will dry your skin? It’s actually hydrating.
Float, from $89 for 60 minutes.
Sleep therapy
Originally developed by scientists to treat PTSD in vets, the Equinox Hotel’s Wave Table is the ultimate power-nap machine.
Using a combination of acoustic, vibrational and LED color therapy, a 30-minute session on the recliner is said to confer the benefits of a three-hour snooze.
After choosing between gentle or deep mode, guests stretch out on the bed’s heated and illuminated water-filled cushion, slip on headphones and enjoy the restorative undulations and sounds.
Quantum Harmonics Brain & Body Boost, from $60 for 30 minutes.
Acupuncture
A gorgeously decorated space adds to Ora’s elevated experience, according to unanimous fivestar online reviews.
From the marble check-in counter and plush beds to specialty herbal teas and tonics, everything at this acupuncture studio feels luxurious and healing.
Director of Acupuncture Gabriel Sher and his staff create custom plans for each patient to treat everything from muscle pain and digestive issues to stress and anxiety.
Cupping therapy and gua sha (skin scraping with a Chinese tool) are chi-balancing add-ons.
Acupuncture, from $75 for 30-minute session with tea.
Fertility acupuncture
Yinova co-founder Jill Blakeway and her team of board-certified practitioners have helped thousands of NYC-area women get pregnant, working with OB-GYNs to devise individualized “pre-mester” programs — a mix of acupuncture, herbs, lifestyle and dietary advice.
“The reason we’re popular is that we’re not ‘alternative,’ ” says the doctor of acupuncture and author of “Making Babies.”
“We integrate everything with Western medicine. There’s considerable research that acupuncture helps the efficacy of IVF.”
Initial consultations from $150, acupuncture from $135.
LED technology
It might sound woo-woo, but scientists say LED light therapy is a safe treatment for a variety of conditions, including skin aging, acne, skin conditions, and joint and muscle pain.
Guests at Rescue Spa rest under its FDA-cleared LED contouring face and body panels that emit blue, red and near-infrared wavelengths, then flip over after 20 minutes.
The energy delivered by the LEDs is said to increase tissue rejuvenation and reduce pain and inflammation, all without downtime.
See the light?
LED Body, $250 for 45 minutes.
Water ritual
Luxuriating in an onsen (natural hot springs or public indoor bath) is a Japanese national pastime.
Inspired by the venerated bathing tradition, the Greenwich Hotel’s Shibui Spa proposes 105 minutes of unadulterated bliss: a mineral-rich soak in a private ofuro tub, followed by an hour and a half of traditional shiatsu therapy.
And as soon as the lantern-lit pool reopens, follow the treatment with a transporting dip in the water, beneath the 250-year-old imported Japanese farmhouse frame.
Hinoki Ritual, $365.
Couples treatment
For double the pleasure and twice the fun, try Aire Ancient Baths’ intoxicating Wine Bath Experience for Two.
The romantic three-hour journey features a 15-minute scalp massage, a 30-minute private soak in a red-wine extract solution thoughtfully paired with glasses of the real thing, and a 60-minute body massage with grapeseed oil.
A tour through thermal baths of different temperatures (masked, if desired), from a 50-degree ice bath to the 102-degree Caldarium, adds to the indulgence.
Wine Bath Experience for Two, from $450 per person.
Cryotherapy
What a way to chill out.
Clean Market’s nitrogen-cooled cryotherapy chambers freeze your body for two to three arctic minutes.
While the FDA has not approved the increasingly popular modality, elite athletes including LeBron James, Rafael Nadal and Floyd Mayweather use it to prepare for and recover after sporting events.
Proponents say that exposure to subzero temps (around -220 degrees F) speeds muscle recovery, boosts energy, eases pain and inflammation and even
restores collagen.
Baby, it’s cold inside.
Whole Body Cryo, $75.
Massage
Mer.
You deserve a medal if you manage to stay awake during the ultra-relaxing, pampering Swedish massage at Baccarat Hotel’s Spa de la Mer in Midtown.
Using long, kneading strokes and just the right amount of pressure to work
out muscle tension, the massage therapist also hydrates skin with La Mer Body Crème (Chrissy Teigen’s fave).
Spa patrons are invited to book for one hour, free of charge, a cabana with two elegant white daybeds at the 55-foot black-and-white tiled pool.
Even the thought is calming.
Swedish massage, $245 for 60 minutes.